Reading Rhetorically

Prereading (Section One)

Activity 1: Getting Ready to Read: Define Orwellian
Introduction: Sometimes an authors ideas are so unique and powerful that his or her name
becomes synonymous with the ideas. One example is Niccol Machiavelli, whose book The
Prince advises a new ruler that the end always justifies the means in acquiring and maintaining
power. Thus, the term Machiavellian describes a plan that is clever, effective, but also deceitful
and unethical. Ivan Pavlov, a Russian scientist, rang a bell every time he fed his dogs and
demonstrated that over time the dogs associated the bell with food and began to salivate when
they heard it. Now conditioned responses like this, such as when high school students respond
in certain ways to the bells and buzzers that designate class periods, are called Pavlovian. In
his analysis of dreams, Sigmund Freud found that the imagery of dreams was full of sexual
symbols. Now the practice of finding such symbols in dreams, stories, and everyday objects is
called Freudian.
The word Orwellian is probably almost as commonly used as the terms mentioned above.
However, the meanings and associations of Orwellian are as complex as the world of the
novel. It is sometimes difficult to pin down exactly what someone means by the word. It might
refer to a totalitarian government, a government that tries to control all the actions and beliefs of
its citizens. It might refer to the use of surveillance technology, such as hidden cameras and
microphones, as part of that effort to control. It could refer to the particular ways of speaking and
thinking that Big Brother and the ruling party in the novel prescribe in Newspeak. It might even
refer to the rewriting of history to fit the political needs of the present. Of course, it could be a
combination of two or more of the above. As we read 1984, we will return to the question of the
meaning of Orwellian several times.
Orwell wrote this novel in 1948. He turned the last two digits around to come up with 1984. The
novel is a work of science fiction about an imagined future, but it draws on what was for Orwell
the recent past, the history of World War II, in which the fascist government of Adolf Hitlers Nazi
Germany fought the communist government of Josef Stalins Soviet Union. Although fascism
and communism are considered to be opposite political systems, both countries had
authoritarian governments with powerful dictators, secret police, and violent suppression of
political opponents. In imagining the country of Oceania and its ruler Big Brother, Orwell gives
the government the power to watch and control every aspect of a citizens life through everpresent two-way telescreens that both display propaganda and observe the viewer.
The year 1984 has come and gone. Are the questions and possibilities of 1984, the novel, still
relevant? Lets look at some recent articles.

Christina DesMarais, writing in PC World says in This Smartphone Tracking Tech Will Give You
the Creeps: New GPS Tech Can Track Your Every Move:
Privacy fans, take note: A new technology, called Indoor Positioning System, could push your
worry meter to the max. IPS allows pinpoint tracking of any Wi-Fi-enabled device, such as a
smartphone or tablet, within a building. This means that an IPS service could easily track you
right down to, say, the table youre occupying in a malls food courtas long as your mobile
devices Wi-Fi is turned on. And, if youre a typical device user, your Wi-Fi is always on, right?
Does it bother you if a subscriber to a location service can tell exactly where you are at all times
without your knowledge by following your device? Tom Henderson, writing in ITworld, became
so concerned about how much Google knew about his online behavior that he tried to
completely eliminate Google from his online services. In How I Divorced Google: Leave
Google, and Save Your Privacy in 7 Days (Or At Least Get a Start on It), he writes,
When I sit at home, Google (unless I consciously prevent it) knows where I sit, on what
machine, and what time of day Im there. Data is collected not only from the search engine site,
but sites that I visit that have Google maps, and so forth. The penetration of Googles ability to
sniff a single individuals location and preferences is unprecedented. Google knows more about
me than my mother.
Of course, if Hendersons mother subscribed to the Indoor Positioning System described above,
she would know where he is too. Is this what people would call Orwellian surveillance? In
these examples, the purpose of the surveillance or what the observers will do with the
information are not clear. It is not the government that is observing the citizens. However, the
government certainly has access to information of this type if it wants to. Of course, sometimes
it does. In fact, the FBI created its own Internet surveillance system called Carnivore, which it
later abandoned in favor of commercial products. The Associated Press reports,
The FBI has effectively abandoned its custom-built Internet surveillance technology, once known
as Carnivore, designed to read e-mails and other online communications among suspected
criminals, terrorists and spies, according to bureau oversight reports submitted to Congress.
Instead, the FBI said it has switched to unspecified commercial software to eavesdrop on
computer traffic during such investigations and has increasingly asked Internet providers to
conduct wiretaps on targeted customers on the governments behalf, reimbursing companies for
their costs.
Jeff Tyson, in How Carnivore Worked, observed that for many, it was eerily reminiscent of
George Orwells book 1984. Apparently, there have been misuses of this technology. Peter J.
Georgiton, writing in an Ohio State Law Review article, The FBIs Carnivore: How Federal
Agents May Be Viewing Your Personal E-Mail and Why There Is Nothing You Can Do about It,
says,

Instances of misconduct by the FBI demonstrate that unsupervised use of Carnivore could
easily lead to abuse. In the end, judicial supervision of the FBIs use of Carnivore will be
necessary to prevent the Orwellian situation of 1984where everyones thoughts and writings
are being probed by an overbearing, omnipotent, and intrusive federal government.
Two of the sources above connect the governments attempts to read the emails and other
online communications of criminals, terrorists, and spies to the Orwellian world of 1984. At
this point you should have some idea of what people mean when they use the word Orwellian.